The Border

We are now in the Maroni River after a wonderful overnight sail of about 120nm to the Northeast of Iles du Salut. The weather and sea combined to make this the best overnight leg we've ever done. The sea was flat and Anjea cut thru the water on a reach at up to 7 kn in the 10 - 15 kn breeze. Add to that the 1 to 1.5kn current and we traveled at 8 to 9 knots under a clear sky and a sliver of moon. Dolphins came out to make phosphorescent trails in our bow wave and Merel even saw a whale breach. The only downside is that I caught no fish!! I put out a brand new lure and when I hauled it in the lure was gone, so clearly a BIG fish got away and we have rice porridge for breakfast instead of fried fish.

The town of Saint Laurent is about 20nm upriver and the tide is against us so we motor hard from mid-morning to mid-afternoon, crawling along at 4kn. On arrival I expect to anchor but there are moorings and Helmund, from one of the yachts already there, comes out in a dinghy to help us hook up just as the sky turns black and the rain comes bucketed down. Helmund and his partner stip and take a shower on their deck while we have a celebratory glass of plonk and eat a quick evening meal before crashing.

The border between Suriname and French Guyana runs down the east bank of the river. Since we are anchored in the river itself we are technically in Suriname, but when we row the 50 yards to shore we'll be in back in French Guyana. It will be interesting to see how this all works in practice since we are currently cleared in to no country!